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Wednesday, January 23, 2008

Velvet Underground Evolutionary Tree

I made this simple chart because some people insist on clinging to their silly Creationist superstitions, and won't accept the truth that everything worthwhile came from the Velvet Underground.

15 comments:

you materialist scientists go on and on about the VU when anybody with any common sense would look at the tree you draw and think to themselves, "how would such an orderly unfolding even be possible without the intervention of Roky Erickson?"

Speaking as somebody who is a HUGE fan of the Velvets and has been for ages -- I actually saw the post Lou version with Doug Yule and his brother (they sucked, of course) -- I have no idea why we're having this argument. Other than apparently you live in some alternate universe where Lou didn't screw up that legendary meeting with Brian Epstein.

Then again, Lou Reed sprung from Delmore Schwartz and Allen Ginsburg, Cale from La Monte Young and the Dream Syndicate, and Nico from the Brecht/Weill voice school of "Who needs a melody?"

>Ken Houghton - Amen! though I kinda liked Lou's Live album, the one all the critics panned, surely not solely cuz of Lou's "It's the journalists, it's the fuckin' journalists" screed. Cale's latest, Black Acetate, is supreme.

John Cale produced the first Iggy Pop album, as well as demos for the Modern Lovers, so he is well represented on this chart. I couldn't figure out where to squeeze in Roxy Music (or David Bowie!) but there was a discussion of them on PowerPop, so they weren't left out either. Cavjam - you are the man for coming up with those connections - but can't we blame Nico on Fellini?

Your first offspring -- Iggy and the Stooges -- came directly outta VU? Piffffle. Try listening to The Sonics, (e.g. "Strychnine") and it'll be obvious that the Stooges sound a helluva lot more like the Seattle badasses in their white Corvettes, than they ever did the drug-chic beatnik New York art-factory hipsters.

For what its worth, i this is incorrect.1. VU begat Iggy Pop?. i don't think so. VU was all about art and avant garde. VU was, and rightly so, highly influential to a large number of bands and artists (including performance artists). But Iggy was punk. Iggy was definitely at the beginnings of Punk but i think it would be more accurate to say: "Kinks -> Iggy Pop -> Pistols. 2. Also New Wave was not an offshoot of the Pistols. There's no one in their right mind that would say that Devo was the same as The Clash. Punk was a statement, New Wave was fashion.

"I like the Velvet Underground and I'm one of those very few people who really, really like Nico's music." - Iggy Pop, Jazz & Pop, 1969 (as quoted in Gimme Danger)

"Bob Dylan (Bringing it all Back Home and Highway 61 Revisted) and Lou Reed (the banana album) both influenced me by the way they'd used breathy vocals and very effortlessly ride a strong beat underneath it... I used that technique on 'I Wanna Be Your Dog' and 'Real Cool Time'" - Iggy Pop, Spin, 1986 ditto